Purple People Eater
by hermyohkneegee
Summary: Rose and the tenth Doctor end up landing in London on the way to an alien planet and get involved in three murders. Can they stop whoever or whatever that's doing it and save the innocent?


Title: Purple People Eater

Chapter: 1

Pairing: None

Genre: Adventure/General

Words: 1348

Summary: Rose and the (tenth) Doctor end up at the Powell estate again, and get caught up in three murders. Can they find out the person (or alien) that's causing them and save the innocent?

Cold night. Spring, just-rained, pavements and roads and everything glistening with water. Win cut across the car park, cold and unpleasant. Anything could happen on a night like this. Young woman alone, on the way home from work, out with no-one about..

Footsteps! Real or not? Thud-thud of heartbeat, rush of blood in ears, scream of terror in the mind.

Real scream. Real desperation. Real hand grabbing Rhian's shoulder, spinning her about. Dark face, filled with shadows, black clothes and blackk eyes in the black night.

Slam. Hand, fist, hit's face. Crack. Nose breaks. Sobbing terror. The attacker puts a black-gloved hand into a pocket, tugs out a silver.. Thing. Silver, some sort of gleaming metal, pushed to Rhian's throat. Not sharp. Blunt. Bzzzz. Machine noise.

Then nothing. Rhian goes limp. Thud-thud of heart increases, thudthudthudthudthud. Then even more nothing.

And then..

Silent attacker, silent killer, pulls back a hood. Not-human face emerges. Human colours- peachy skin, no hair. But features..

Twisted features. Alien features. Sharp and pointed, too-small eyes set in a too-large head. Eyes don't blink. Mouth opens and opens. Two rows of teeth in a jaw that unhooks, snake-like. The silent killer leans down to it's silent prey and starts eating it. Fast, all in one. Leaves clothes. Leaves bones.

Silent killer pulls up it's black hood and leaves the black car park.

Rose rushed to the door of the TARDIS as soon as she felt the dull thud which meant they had landed.

"So we're actually going to an alien planet this time? Not Cardiff? Not a new version of Earth?"

"Yep. Barbados 5, colonised by humans in the year 5,027. Sun, sea, sand, little drinks with umbrellas in," the Doctor said, standing with his legs spread, one-hand on hip, as if he thought he was Peter Pan.

Grinning, Rose threw open the door to a cold, windy night. The grin fell from her face. She turned about, staring at the Doctor.

"Or," he said, just as cheerily, "Earth."

"Why are we here _this_ time?" Sighed Rose, closing the door to the TARDIS. She leaned against it, observing the Doctor as he dashed around to stare at the screen on the mushroomoid control panel.

"Good point," he said, frowning at the green symbols. "2006. London. Near where you live, actually. We're in a car park. A.. Sainsbury's car park. On a.. Sunday," he said, sounding just as bemused as Rose was. "We must've followed a distress signal."

"A distress signal from Sainbury's? What, the oranges are being attacked?"

"Very serious, that. Orange genocide," the Doctor agreed, wandering out of the TARDIS with Rose close behind. "Or it could be that."

Rose looked about for what he was talking about. There was nothing out of the ordinary about. Cars, litter, no people.. A pile of clothes? Was that it? "Someone went stripping?" She asked, frowning. The Doctor leant down and picked up the red top with a logo emblazoned on it. A pile of bones fell down onto the jeans that were already on the floor.

"Stripped off their flesh," he agreed, examining the clothes.

"Extremist," Rose said faintly. The Doctor had dropped the shirt and was now examining the jeans, then trainers, and then peering around at the wet floor.

"There's no blood," he said. This seemed to worry him just as much as finding bones had. "The flesh is gone and there's not a drip of blood!"

"Could you stop saying flesh so much?" Rose asked, looking disgusted. The Doctor didn't even pause in his search. He grabbed the sonic screwdriver from his pocket and pointed it at the pile of clothes and bones, flicking the button a few times before holding it in.

"Nothing," he confirmed.

"Alien, then?" Rose asked, trying to avert her eyes from the debris of a body on the floor, stomping her feet to keep warm.

"Probably. Come on," he said, jogging back to the TARDIS, all bags of energy.

"Aren't we staying to investigate, then?" Rose asked as she entered what should have been a tiny box but was an infinitely large time ship.

The Doctor was flipping levers and rolling the ball-thingy on the console. "'Course we are," he said, rasing his brows at her in surprise. "Yeah, yeah, 'course we are! Can't do it at night, can we?"

The TARDIS was lurching and shaking, quickly thudding as it landed. The Doctor and Rose stepped out of the police box that was parked in the Powell Estate, opposite the Chinese and near the youth club.

"Mickey's?" Rose asked, and the Doctor nodded. They both took off down the street.

Mickey Smith didn't ask for much. A new DVD recorder, yeah. Maybe a better laptop. His girlfriend to come back from travelling around the universe with a mad alien. For his girlfriend to _stop_ coming back from travelling with a mad alien at the most stupid moments.

Now was a start. He was having a nice day in with Trisha, just in his flat, sitting about and watching a DVD (something she liked about a girl who fell in love with a lawyer) and listening to her natter on. It was _nice_. It was okay. It wasn't like it was with Rose- it wasn't quite _that_ nice, but it was all right, he supposed.

Not that he had many better things to do. He was itching to get on his computer, though, to start looking into the murder of that girl in the Sainsbury's just down the road. No doubt it'd come in handy at some point. Those things always did, when you needed to impress a certain girl.

And that certain girl had just decided to pop up with her new boyfriend in the middle of the film, all grins and trying to get in to know what he knew about it.

"All right, Rickey?" The Doctor said, all mad grin that wasn't the same as it used to be, but it was bad enough.

"Don't start that again," Mickey said, glaring at him. "What do you want?"

"Oh, a cup of tea'd be nice," he said, sticking his hands in his pockets. "A biscuit. Find out what killed that girl."

"And I'm meant to help you on that?" Mickey said. He wasn't impressed.

"Who's there, Mick?" Trisha asked when she finally got up from the sofa to see what was taking so long. Her eyes rested on Rose and she paused, smile freezing on her face and becoming decidedly cold. "Oh. Rose. And.."

"The Doctor," the man himself supplied. His grin hadn't faltered, and he pushed past both Mickey and Trisha into the flat, dashing off to the living room. Mickey followed him in disbelief, watching as he grabbed the laptop and dialled up to the web. "So. What do you know about that girl, then?"

"Not much. Didn't have a chance to look anything up. Just what's in the paper."

The Doctor paused, and turned to look at Mickey. He seemed slightly disappointed by that, as if Mickey hadn't been doing his job. Not that it _was_ Mickey's job- he did have a live, after all, and he did have a girlfriend to spend time with. "It's the third murder," he said helpfully. This seemed to spark the Doctor's interest.

"What, third murder where they don't have any _skin_?" Rose asked, piping up from the silence she had started at the sight of Trisha.

"Yeah, basically. All around here, too."

"You've got yourselves a local alien," The Doctor said, sounding impressed. He had put the laptop down again and had put his glassed on, grabbing a newspaper from the coffee table. "Harriet Jones isn't very lucky these days," he added dully, reading the front page. "Ah! Here we go! Suspects being held in the Met. Police station!"

"So, what, you're just gonna walk in and start askin' questions?" Mickey asked, raising his brows.

"With a disguise. Come on, Rose!" The Doctor grinned, and with a quick goodbye from Rose, they were gone.

Mickey didn't realise until then that Trisha had gone too.


End file.
